Maltese bloggers

04.10.2014 BLOGS Malta
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The Maltese blogosphere. Some time ago I didn’t know anything about it. Today I know more, a lot more and I met Maltese bloggers personally.

Some time ago I announced the “Travel around the blogs” project under which my plan is to travel around the world, meet bloggers, get to know their countries, interesting people, places, local cuisine. It’s not a scientific research project but more of an observational and exploratory one although who knows what it’ll become in the future. Malta was my first destination.

The first day of the project already showed promise. A meeting with thirteen Maltese beauty bloggers. Thirteen! The girls must have been as stressed as I was. I asked them questions, jumped around with the camera, filmed, took pictures. It was a lovely meeting which made me realize I should start an English website for the project because bloggers want to read about bloggers from other countries. And so here is.

The girls were eager to listen about the Polish bloggers, about the projects, meetings, collabs. They didn’t think our blogosphere is so well-developed. They were extremely excited about the possibility of an international bloggers’ meeting in the future. Personally, I am still excited.

General information

There are few bloggers in Malta. Besides, the country itself is a small island where people travel between towns on foot.

For Maltese people the word “blogger” is an enigmatic one. Moreover, most companies are unaware of the bloggers’ existence and potential.

Bloggers appear in Maltese media from time to time but more alongside some sort of an event rather than asked for an opinion on the topic they blog about.

I was invited to a facebook group which unites Matlese bloggers. There are 91 people in it, mostly beauty, fashion and lifestyle bloggers and some beauty youtubers. I expect that might be the exact number of bloggers in Malta. In this group the bloggers link their posts, exchange interesting information and articles associated with industries related to their blogs (fashion, beauty, lifestyle).

A lot of Maltese blogs are blogs of expats. Though very interesting (e.g. movingonupaway.com), in my project I try to focus on the natives of each country.

Most of the readers of Maltese blogs are not of Maltese nationality. Malta is a small island but all the blogs are in English which enables readers from all over the world to read them.

Beauty bloggers

The beauty blogosphere is the biggest and the most integrated one in Malta. Malta – beautiful girls, it fits. However, the girls don’t see each other very often, once a month a dozen or so go out to have a drink or for dinner. Sometimes they see each other during events organized by various brands.

There aren’t many shops in Malta which is why the girls order the products for reviews abroad, on the Internet.

Brands aren’t aware of the bloggers’ potential. Fashion and beauty bloggers are invited to events where they receive products for testing. There are no paid deals in the beauty blogosphere. From time to time the bloggers organize contests for their readers but they have to sponsor the rewards themselves.

Beauty bloggers I met:

Food bloggers

I was certain that there are many food bloggers in Malta. I envisioned a series of meetings with delicious food. Unfortunately. Blogging about food isn’t popular in Malta. There are many culinary hotheads who have Facebook pages and they post their photos and recipes there. I was, however, lucky to meet the only (I think) culinary blogger in Malta. And what a blogger she is, Liz Ayling. You will have the chance to read about her in two more of my posts: about Maltese food and non-standard blog promotion.

Except for her blog, Liz owns a website about Malta maltainsideout.com, organizes trips around Malta and knows where you can eat delicious Maltese food which – weirdly enough – is really hard to come by in Malta.

Food blogger:

Fashion bloggers

The number of fashion bloggers is even smaller than the number of beauty bloggers. They can be counted on the fingers of one hand. They don’t hold cyclical meetings like the beauty bloggers. If they ever meet it is in small groups or during events organized by various brands.

Fashion bloggers are the most recognizable group among the Maltese blogosphere. Companies slowsly start to appreciate their potential. Deals happen from time to time but they are mostly barter.

Daniel Azzopardi is the most well-known fashion blogger. I was close to meeting with him and I was very happy to be able to talk to a blogging guy. Unfortunately, he had to cancel the meeting just before it happened (business, business and being busy). Oh well. I did meet, however, with the charming Bianca who told me a bit about the background of fashion blogging. Who likes who etc. I asked if she ever heard about Polish bloggers and it turns out she likes to visit Maffashion’s blog.

An important event for the fashion blogosphere was the introduction of the Fashion Blogger Award at the Malta Fashion Week. Daniel, who I mentioned above, received it.

Fashion bloggers:

Political bloggers

The Maltese blogosphere contributed significantly to the political debate about divorces which took place three years ago.
Until 2011 Malta was the only member state of the European Union where divorces were illegal. A referendum on allowing them was carried out in 2011. There was a debate about this topic in the media, supporters and opponents of the proposed new law were fighting heavily.

The Maltese blogosphere became one of the platforms for dialogue, it dealt with issues that were being partially or completely ignored by traditional media. A “blogosfera’s divorce debate network” was created – blogs that were writing about the referendum were being linked to.

Here you can find the authors of those discussions: themaltachronicle.wordpress.com I didn’t get the chance to meet with political bloggers (I wasn’t in Malta long enough). I did mail, however, with Alex Grech who deals with Malta’s digital media and political blogosphere.

“Pics or it didn’t happen”

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I didn’t find any parenting, interior design or technology bloggers in Malta. The girls I spoke to also couldn’t name anyone who deals with those topics. This is reminiscent of the situation in Poland a few years ago when it was difficult for bloggers to name bloggers from outside their topic. It might be the case that there aren’t any bloggers specializing in those topics in Malta at the time. I will come back to Malta in some time to see if anything changed.

I still have to edit the blogging and travel related video from Malta, where you will be able to find the bloggers’ opinions about the Maltese blogosphere.

Soon I will visit another country. It also starts with an “M”:)

Ten post jest dostępny w języku: Polski

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